


O for the touch of a vanished hand

by tigriswolf



Series: Alternate Universe [77]
Category: Supernatural, Ten Inch Hero
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Amnesia, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-30
Updated: 2012-06-30
Packaged: 2017-11-08 20:53:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/447448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tigriswolf/pseuds/tigriswolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It happened the winter Dean turned sixteen. He and Dad were hunting a werewolf; Sam stayed back the room, three towns over. Dean made the kill-shot and they burned the corpse. Dean was riding high, thrilled and excited, and Dad was distracted enough to drive off the snow-covered road into an ancient oak.</p><p>Dean woke up a few days later, but he was no longer Dean.</p>
            </blockquote>





	O for the touch of a vanished hand

**Author's Note:**

> Title: O for the touch of a vanished hand  
> Fandom: Ten Inch Hero/“Supernatural” crossover  
> Disclaimer: not my characters; just for fun. Title from Tennyson.  
> Warnings: AU for SN before pilot; slight AU for TIH  
> Pairings: canon  
> Rating: PG  
> Wordcount: 1830  
> Point of view: third

It happened the winter Dean turned sixteen. He and Dad were hunting a werewolf; Sam stayed back the room, three towns over. Dean made the kill-shot and they burned the corpse. Dean was riding high, thrilled and excited, and Dad was distracted enough to drive off the snow-covered road into an ancient oak.

Dean woke up a few days later, but he was no longer Dean.

He’d been found, he was told, in a car. An older man had been in the driver’s seat, dead. There’d been half a dozen IDs, but none with his face or name. He remembered how to walk and talk and flirt, but nothing of his past remained.

He spent a month in the hospital, called _kid, sweetie_ , and _honey_ , but no family ever claimed him. Once he was all healed up, they had to release him, and the system took him in.

The first time a foster-brother picked on him, he broke the boy’s arm and realized he was dangerous. He went to school under the name Michael Smith, which he’d pulled out of a hat; he knew math and the basic sciences, but English and history held no interest and he didn’t bother to relearn what he’d forgotten. But when he discovered music, he fell in love. All music, any music, from hard rock all the way down to classical. He listened to it all.

By senior year, he’d aced the math and science classes while floundering in all the rest, and had pierced everything pierceable. He had two tattoos and bloody nightmares about guns.

He never felt like a Michael. He answered to it but never internalized it, and after graduation, he left Connecticut and headed for California. He shed the skin of Michael, trying out identities on the way to the Pacific. In every town, every time he got picked up by the side of the road, he became someone new. Finally, in Santa Cruz, smelling salt air, he settled on Priestly, a rebel with his own voice, no past, and an opinion on everything.

He thought he might be twenty-two when he got there, but couldn’t be sure. He experimented with hair colors and styles, and listened to a new CD every day. He’d tried a dozen jobs on his way across the country and discovered an affinity for cars.

After a few months in Santa Cruz he found two sources of employment: the Beach City Grill and a garage just down the street from it. To celebrate lasting employment, half a year in, he had a long design tattooed down his neck.

Priestly still had bloody nightmares about guns. He sometimes felt like he was casing places, picking out the threats, deciding how to put them down with minimal fuss. To stay sharp—there must’ve been some reason he knew how to fight—he visited a martial arts studio weekly.

Twelve years after waking up, he had Trucker and Tish and Jen, and then Zo and Piper, and it was enough. It had to be enough. But Tish fucked anything that moved, except him, so he decided to try one last thing. He removed the piercings, shaved the sideburns, and washed out the dye in his hair. He stared at himself in the mirror—a stranger looked back, a man with no past and no name.

He walked into the Beach City Grill as someone he couldn’t remember ever being and Tish’s mouth dropped open. “ _Holy shit_ ,” she said.

He fumbled his lines, asking her out, and she demanded only one thing: his real name.

Priestly dropped his eyes. “I don’t know,” he said. “I woke up in a Connecticut hospital twelve years ago with no memory of who I’d been.”

She studied him for a moment, face softening. “Tish is short for Platicia,” she confessed and then told him to pick her up at seven.

They spent almost a year as a couple before deciding they’d be better as friends. Priestly kept the ear and nose studs but grew his hair out some. He worked insane hours at the garage, but stayed at the Grill two days a week.

His bloody dreams got bloodier and sometimes he heard a man scream _Dean!_

Priestly had never fired a gun. He didn’t like them. But after a particularly nasty dream—fire, smoke, blood, and pain—he went to a shooting range, borrowed a gun, and shot a target between the eyes, through the heart, and in the crotch. He lowered the gun in shock. Who had he been before that car accident? The car was full of weapons; he remembered being asked about them. But he had no identity. He had a dead stranger and IDs with half a dozen names, none of which had his face.

He had been dangerous. He was still dangerous, and he gently set the gun down to stare at his hands.

He could have killed Tad that night. He’d wanted to, and that desire had kept him on the ground. If Trucker hadn’t come out, Priestly honestly didn’t know what he would’ve done, and he stared at his hands in horrified wonder. He felt the fury welling, that night on the ground. He felt the violence in him waiting to be uncoiled.

Priestly left the range and went to his apartment where he took a long shower. He scoured his skin till he bled, but that night he had a nightmare anyway.

Priestly was late to the Grill the next morning. He didn’t bother putting in any of his studs or any make-up on, and he wore old, ratty clothes.

“Somethin’ wrong?” Trucker asked.

Priestly shook his head. “Just bad dreams,” he said. “Nothing new.”

He worked with only half his mind, most of him trying to piece together the clues into something resembling an answer. So he could fire a gun pretty good. He could kick some ass. He still had no name, and no family to claim.

“Priestly,” Jen said and he turned away from the grill to focus on her. “Piper called in sick, Trucker went for a walk with Zo, and Tish is on break. Could you take the counter while I run to the bathroom?”

“Sure, Jen,” he replied. “No problemo.”

She smiled at him and headed for the back. It was the middle of the morning, so there wasn’t any crowd. He drummed on the counter, straining his memory for anything before Connecticut. But there was nothing, just a blank, a dark chasm that had only bloody nightmares about guns and sometimes a man screaming _Dean._

 _Was I Dean?_ Priestly wondered. _Is that my name?_

A bolt of pain shot through his Priestly’s head so he shifted his thoughts to a car at the garage.

“Okay, Sam,” a tall blonde said into her cell, coming into the shop. “I gotta go order, so get your ass over here.” She nodded. “Love you too, babe. Hurry up!” She flipped her cellphone shut and slipped it into her pocket, stepping up to the counter and smiling at Priestly.

“What can I get you?” he asked, pen and pad ready.

She glanced at the menu. “A ten-inch club and a six-inch three-meat , please,” she said.

He jotted that down. “Any drinks, salads, or sides?”

She thought for a second. “Lemonade, Coke, potato chips, a chocolate chip cookie, and a cupcake.”

He nodded. “Okay, miss, that’ll be fifteen thirty-seven.” He glanced up. “Cash or credit?”

She handed over a twenty and leaned in conspiratorially. “My boyfriend’ll be here in a few minutes and it’s his birthday. Is there any way I could get a candle for the cupcake?”

Priestly grinned. “Hell yeah, girl,” he said. “Give me a second—I know we have candles in the back.”

She smiled. “Thank you,” she said.

He passed her the cups and opened the register, but she told him, “Keep the change,” and went to the drink dispenser.

Headed for the back, he ran into Jen. “Hey, do we have candles?” he asked.

She looked around the messy room. “Somewhere, I think. Why?”

“I promised a customer we could put a candle on her boyfriend’s cupcake,” he explained.

Jen bit her lip and thought for a moment. “Well, I have no idea where they are. I’ll go buy some. You stay here.”

Priestly returned to the front to see Tish back and a giant sitting across from the tall blonde, holding her hand. They were smiling and laughing, and the giant ducked his head, blushing.

“Freakishly adorable, right?” Tish asked.

Priestly nodded, chuckling, and pressed a fond kiss to the top of her head before quickly making the lovebirds’ sandwiches and loading up the tray. They already had the cookie and chips, so Priestly waited for the candle.

Jen rushed in with a pack of green candles. “It was all they had,” she said. “Will it work?”

Priestly nodded. He opened the pack and stuck one of the candles into the cupcake, lighting it. 

“Should we sing?” Jen asked.

Priestly shook his head. “I’ll take the tray out to ‘em.”

The giant looked up in shock when Priestly stopped at the table and said, “Delivery for Sasquatch.”

“Jess!” he hissed. “I told you not to celebrate!”

The tall blonde, Jess, said, “You tell me that every year, Sam. I never listen.” She took the sandwiches off the tray while Priestly set the cupcake in front of Sam. Jess continued, “Blow out the candle and make a wish.”

Sam met Priestly’s eyes. “Thanks,” he said sincerely. “You didn’t have to do this.”

Priestly grinned. “It was nothing. So, how old is the birthday boy?”

“Twenty-four,” Jess answered. “And he’ll be a kick-ass lawyer soon.”

Sam ducked his head. “She’s exaggerating.”

Patting the kid’s shoulder, Priestly said, “Blow out the candle and make a wish, Sam.” 

He backed away, leaving the two lovebirds to their early lunch. He watched them till they left, Sam throwing a grin over his shoulder and Jess waving.

Something about the kid was familiar, but Priestly shook it off and cleaned the grill before clocking out to head to the garage.

That night, he dreamed about teaching a little boy to shoot a gun. _Always aim like you mean to kill_ , he said. _Otherwise, it’s a bullet wasted. Got it, Sammy?_

The little boy replied, _Got it, Dean._

Priestly took some of his vacation time the next day and went for a long walk on the beach. He had a choice—wonder about who he’d been forever or move forward, fully embrace Priestly.

As the sun set across the water, he made up his mind. Whoever he’d been, that boy died in a car wrapped around an oak tree during a Connecticut winter. No one claimed him. He knew some dangerous shit, and cars.

But Priestly liked music and old movies and shirts that said stuff. And if Priestly sometimes dreamed about that dead kid’s life(Dean’s?), no one ever had to know.


End file.
